Lessons in Hope : My Unexpected Life with St. John Paul II

Mary Eberstadt, The Claremont Review of Books "For literary as well as spiritual pleasure, one new offering of interest to anyone who luxuriates in reading is George Weigel's Lessons in Hope: My Unexpected Life with St. John Paul II. With settings as panoramic as those of a thriller, and anecdotes about some of the most fascinating figures and scenes of the twentieth century, it's a moving, personal, melodically rendered memoir of the biographer's times with the late great saint." "Reading Lessons of Hope is like watching a play about the making of a play. It's a book about the making of the most comprehensive and compelling biography of Pope John Paul II. No other writer enjoyed anything like the personal access that George Weigel did; no one else can speak now with more authority about the Polish pope's remarkable life journey and its impact. And no one else can tell the story behind the story better than Weigel does in this insightful, revealing postscript."--Andrew Nagorski, former Newsweek Rome and Warsaw bureau chief and author of The Nazi Hunters and Hitlerland "This book recalls a particularly splendid moment in the recent history of Catholicism, a time when a saintly Pope exerted a decisive influence on both the Church and the wider society. But above all, it tells a compelling story of divine providence, the manner in which God wove two lives together-George Weigel's and John Paul II's-for their mutual benefit. Briskly written, intelligent, funny, filled with good stories, Lessons in Hope will be a joy to anyone who reads it."--Bishop Robert Barron Andrew Nagorski, former Newsweek Rome and Warsaw bureau chief and author of The Nazi Hunters and Hitlerland "Reading Lessons of Hope is like watching a play about the making of a play. It's a book about the making of the most comprehensive and compelling biography of Pope John Paul II. No other writer enjoyed anything like the personal access that George Weigel did; no one else can speak now with more authority about the Polish pope's remarkable life journey and its impact. And no one else can tell the story behind the story better than Weigel does in this insightful, revealing postscript." Bishop Robert Barron "This book recalls a particularly splendid moment in the recent history of Catholicism, a time when a saintly Pope exerted a decisive influence on both the Church and the wider society. But above all, it tells a compelling story of divine providence, the manner in which God wove two lives together-George Weigel's and John Paul II's-for their mutual benefit. Briskly written, intelligent, funny, filled with good stories, Lessons in Hope will be a joy to anyone who reads it."